Punakaiki had changed a lot since I had been there as a boy. DOC, with the thoroughness of the post Cave Creek era had constructed an amazing series of walkways, viewing platforms and display boards. Interestingly the geologists aren't sure how the amazing pancake rock structures were formed. I appreciated their honesty and transparency. Sadly, not everyone who writes about origins is as candid. Some Christians and some who don't follow Jesus claim with unreasonable certainty to know how our planet came into being.
Sometimes scientists speak with dogmatic certainty about evolution and big bangs which are only theories. The credibility of science suffers. Dr George Wall, a nobel prize winning Harvard biochemist, is convinced that is impossible for life to have spontaneously arisen from non-life. “…That leads us to only one other conclusion, that of supernatural creation, but we cannot accept that on philosophical grounds, therefore we choose to believe the impossible, that life arose spontaneously by chance."
On the other hand, the credibility of the church suffers when Christians insist with dogmatic beligerence that their understanding of the time frame of God's work of creation is the only way it can be. My point is that these issues are debated even among those who have a high view of the Bible, so let's have the integrity of those who wrote the DOC signs on the origins of those amazing rocks, and acknowledge when we aren't sure.
Anyway, we enjoyed the spectacular Punakaiki as well as Hokitika and many other beautiful places from Haast Pass to Westport and the Buller Gorge as we travelled through on holiday.
Don't leave home til you've seen the country!
Martin.
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